Does Your Office Look Clean and Inviting?
There are many ways to make a great first impression for your patients.
- A friendly and smiling staff
- Making eye contact
- Answering the phone with a purpose and intent to help the caller.
But their experience isn't only how you communicate with them. When a new patient arrives at your practice, the last thing you want them to do is turn away because they couldn't find your sign or the waiting area had trash everywhere. We've seen practices with holes in the walls and other major interior issues wondering why their new patients don't come back.
You could be the best physician in the world, but if your office looks like Mayhem from Allstate just swept through, your patients most likely won't return.
Here are some questions to check if you are giving the best first impression of your office.
- Are your signs obvious and neatly displayed?
- Are the bushes surrounding the front entrance trimmed?
- Are your air vents dusted and cleaned regularly?
- Is your decor clean, aesthetically pleasing, and unbroken?
- Is your clinic cleaned by a professional or a staff member every evening and during the day?
- Does your front office staff tidy up the waiting area before lunch and before they leave?
- Does your clinical staff clean the exam rooms between each patient?
- Are your front office and clinical areas neat, tidy, and clutter-free?
If your patients walk to the exam room and see an unorganized workspace, they will assume that your practice is dysfunctional. Do you want that to be your patient's impression on their first day? You wouldn't go back to a doctor's office if you noticed an unstable environment, and you can expect they will either.
Every office should perform regular cleaning practices daily, but even more so with the COVID-19 pandemic and flu season. A clean workplace indicates a clean, quality service will be provided.
Patients have a choice of where to go for their healthcare. Their first impression has to be a good impression or it will be the last impression.